


Unplanned Parenthood - Klaine Advent 2012 Drabbles

by nadiacreek



Series: Unplanned Parenthood [2]
Category: Glee
Genre: Kid Fic, M/M, Parenthood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-01
Updated: 2013-11-30
Packaged: 2018-01-03 02:42:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 24
Words: 7,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1064784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nadiacreek/pseuds/nadiacreek
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I wrote these drabbles in the Unplanned Parenthood universe from the Klaine Advent 2012 daily one-word prompts. They are not in chronological order but it should be pretty clear from each drabble where it falls in the verse. These drabbles do not form a complete story with a plot. Instead, each one is a stand-alone scene.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Timing

“He’s definitely getting faster at that,” Kurt said, a note of approval in his voice.

Blaine smiled at their son crawling around the floor just outside the metal gate protecting their Christmas tree. “Limited time only! He’ll be walking soon.”

“They really do grow up so fast, like everyone says,” Kurt said sadly. “Hey, let’s preserve this for posterity!” He scooped Colin up in one hand and plopped him down at one end of the living room, facing out, then grabbed the video camera and raced to the other side of the room.

Kurt pressed the Record button. “Okay, Colin, I’m timing this! Crawl to Papa and Daddy!”

Colin, on his hands and knees with his feet pressed against the wall, craned his neck to look up at them.

“Come on, Colin! Come on boy!”

“He’s not a dog, Kurt,” Blaine said, giggling.

“Come on! You can do it!”

Colin continued to stare at them, not moving an inch. “Goo!”


	2. History

Kurt rapped on the door with his cane, and it swung open a moment later. A tall black man in a gorgeous red gown stood before them, beaming from ear to ear.

“Hello there, and Happy Christmas, dapper gentlemen!”

Blaine looked their friend up and down. “Are you supposed to be Queen Victoria?”

“Who else would you expect to be hosting a Victorian Christmas party?”

“An excellent point,” Blaine said. He gently guided Kurt and Colin into the house before stepping in behind them.

“May I take your coats?” Queen Victoria asked.

Blaine unbuttoned his trench coat and handed it over, but Kurt shook his head. “Mine is part of the costume,” he said. He twirled around, his tiered cape floating around him, and came to a halt with a tap of his thin black cane on the floor.

“Marvelous!” Queen Victoria said. “And where on earth did you find a toddler-size top hat? It’s adorable!” She squatted down to Colin’s eye level. “Greetings, Little Master Colin! What’s that you’re holding?”

“Froo-kay!” the boy said brightly, holding the wrapped package out to her.

Queen Victoria quirked an eyebrow up at Kurt and Blaine. “Fruitcake? Really? Is this meant to be ironic?”

“It’s delicious!” Kurt insisted.

She stood up, taking the package from Colin. “Well, come in, come in! Delighted to see you all! Join the party!”


	3. Hideaway

Something jabbed against Blaine’s shoulder.

“I got you with my light saber! Zap! You’re dead!” Colin’s high, eager voice rang out.

Blaine played along, toppling himself forward off the couch with an anguished shout. “Aaaaaaaggghhhhh!!!! You got me! I’m dying!” He rolled to his back and looked up at Colin standing above him brandishing … Well, it really did look like a light saber, Blaine would give him that. Long, thin, flexible, and a day-glo shade of blue. Except it was a dildo.

He fought the urge to reach up and grab the toy from his son, fearing that would set off a tug-of-war. Instead, he asked calmly, “Can I see your light saber for a minute?”

“Sure!” Colin said, handing it over.

“Hmm, this isn’t a toy for kids to play with,” Blaine said. “Where did you find it?”

“Under your bed,” Colin said. “What is it?”

“It’s a … grown-up thing for grown-ups to use. When they do grown-up stuff.”

“Like what?” Colin asked.

The image of last night flashed in Blaine’s head, unbidden. Kurt stretched out long and lean on the bed, a pillow over his face to muffle any sounds he couldn’t control while Blaine twisted the dildo in his ass. Blaine’s mouth over the tip of his cock, and Kurt arching up in ecstasy, thrusting to the edge of his throat as he came.

Blaine squirmed uncomfortably. “Uh … nothing interesting. Let’s go wash your hands, okay?”

“Why?”

“Um … it gets awfully dusty under the bed. It’s hard to vacuum under there.”

Blaine stashed the dildo in a dresser drawer while Colin headed for the bathroom. Then he pulled out his phone and texted Kurt.  _We have to find a new hiding place for our toys._


	4. Brick

“Daddy, is our house made out of bricks?”

“We live in a skyscraper, Colin,” Blaine said. “It’s made out of steel and glass.”

Colin’s brow furrowed. “Do any of my friends live in houses made out of bricks?”

“I doubt it. This is Manhattan. Maybe in Brooklyn. Do you have any friends who live in Brooklyn? I don’t think so. It’s kind of far away.”

Colin looked extremely concerned, but Blaine was perplexed as to why. “Do we know  _anyone_  who lives in a house made out of bricks?”

“Um … let me think …” Blaine suddenly brightened. “Grandpa James and Grandma Anna live in a brick house, in Ohio.”

“What about Grandpa Burt and Grandma Carole?”

“I think their house is made out of wood.”

Colin started to cry.

“What’s the matter, honey? Why does it matter what everyone’s house is made of?”

“Because the Big Bad Wolf might come and blow their houses down if they’re not made of bricks,” Colin wailed.

Blaine didn’t laugh. He didn’t laugh. He was very proud of himself for not laughing. “Oh honey,” he pulled Colin into his lap and wrapped his arms around him. “The Three Little Pigs is just a pretend story. Wolves do not really blow houses down. And even if they did, Grandpa Burt and Grandma Carole’s house is very, very strong. Nobody could ever blow it down.”

Colin sniffled and looked up at him. “Really?”

“Really really,” Blaine assured him.

“What about our house?”

“Steel is even stronger than bricks.”

“Really?”

“Absolutely.”


	5. Sheets

Blaine arrived home at 1 AM, typical for a show night. He opened the front door and blinked a few times, taking in the sight. Only half the room was visible—the top half. Sheets were draped across the furniture, taped to walls and lamps, carefully obscuring every bit of floor from view. He laughed at the absurdity, then got down on his hands and knees, crawling under, because it was the only way through the room.

He found Kurt camped out on the floor of the living room, under the draped sheets. He was curled up on top of some blankets, asleep. He was smiling, worn out but happy, and Blaine woke him with a soft kiss.

“What’s all this?” Blaine asked.

“The kids wanted to make a fort out of sheets,” Kurt said, grinning. “It was epic.”

“And you didn’t make them clean it up before bedtime?”

Kurt shook his head.

“Why not?”

“Blaine Hummel, if you need me to answer that question, I am trading you in for a better husband.”

Blaine had to think about it for a second, but when he figured it out, he smiled broadly. “Oh.”

“Look under the couch,” Kurt said mischievously.

Blaine knew better than to ask why this time. He crawled over like a little puppy dog, dutiful and excited at the same time, and retrieved the jigsaw puzzle piece Kurt had hidden there.

Blaine lay down beside him and cuddled into his neck. “You are the best husband,” he whispered.

“Yes I am,” Kurt said, pulling one of the blankets over them.

They couldn’t fall asleep there, naked and sweaty and covered in dried come, because the kids would undoubtedly find them in the morning if they did. So they got up and washed themselves off quickly and changed into t-shirts and shorts for bed. They tiptoed to the kids’ room to check on them, smiling at their silent, peaceful forms in the shadows cast by the nightlight, then closed the door softly and slid under the covers of their own bed.

“Do you miss it?” Blaine asked. “Having no kids and doing wild, romantic things all the time? Being young and free?”

Kurt shook his head. “No regrets,” he whispered.

Blaine looked into his husband’s sparkling blue eyes. “Just love,” he whispered back. “So much love.”


	6. Carol

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The performance Asher gives in this chapter is something like the one shown here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T3Dv0z8pI8

All of Kurt and Blaine’s children could sing. They’d made sure of that, as much as it can be affected by matters other than biology. Mozart at bedtime. Infant music and movement classes from six months of age. Constantly breaking out into pop songs at home, much to their children’s embarrassment as they grew older. Piano and voice lessons for all of them, and at least one other instrument each. They weren’t pushy stage parents, not at all, but music was _important_  in their household.

So all of them could sing. But it was Asher who truly sounded like an angel.

Their hearts fluttered as his voice rang out on the opening notes at the Christmas concert. It was a secular children’s choir, but like any choir worth its salt, they sang religious carols at Christmas time and performed in churches. Kurt always cringed a little to hear his son singing about ‘Christ the Savior’ and ‘the Son of God,’ but the songs were so beautiful it hardly mattered what the lyrics were. Truthfully, he’d rather hear a thousand rehearsals of  _Silent Night_ than  _Jingle Bells_.

The audience sat, transfixed, as Asher sang his solo before being joined by the rest of the choir. It was the most gorgeous sound Kurt had ever heard.

Blaine leaned toward him and said, just loud enough to be heard over the applause, “Do you think he’s old enough to record a solo album?”

Kurt nodded. “Let’s work on a Christmas album for next year.”


	7. Ghost

“Daddy, can I be a ghost for Christmas?” Colin asked.

Trick-or-treating at Halloween had been a huge hit with four-year-old Colin, but it had kind of backfired, because now he thought that every holiday involved dressing up in costumes and walking around the neighborhood to collect candy. Thanksgiving had been a huge disappointment.

“Sweetie, we don’t dress up and go trick-or-treating on Christmas. That’s only for Halloween,” Blaine said gently, for the seven hundredth time.

“What do we do on Christmas?” Colin asked.

“Mainly we give each other presents. Would you like me to help you make a list of what presents you want?”

“Okay!” Colin brightened at this idea. He ran to get a piece of construction paper and an orange crayon and handed them to Blaine.

“Okay, great,” Blaine said. “What’s the first present you would like to have?”

“A chess set.”

“A …” Blaine looked at him. “A chess set? Really?”

“Gabriel’s big brother is teaching me how to play when I go over to his house. It’s so much fun!” Colin’s eyes were completely lit up, a huge smile on his face, and Blaine wondered how he could have possibly missed this development.

“Okay, a chess set. C-H-E-S-S S-E-T.” Colin watched carefully as Blaine printed it in all capital letters. “What else?”

“Dress up like a ghost,” Colin said firmly.

“That’s the present you want?” Blaine asked.

“Yes.”

“Fine,” Blaine said, exasperated. He wrote it down on the paper. “What else?”

“That’s all,” Colin said. He wandered over to his Lego basket and started to build something.

——————————————-

“Merry Christmas!” Burt said, flinging the door to his house open. “Kurt! Blaine! Co— Ghost?”

“Grandpa!” Colin said, leaping into his arms.

Kurt shrugged at his father. “Who were we to deny his Christmas wish?”

Blaine smiled. At least they’d been able to convince Colin not to say “Trick or Treat.”

——————————————————

Colin shouted with excitement when he unwrapped the chess set. “It’s the best present ever! Can we play now?”

“Sure,” Blaine said. He had a basic knowledge of the game, though it had been decades since he’d actually played it.

Colin set up the board in no time, without assistance, to everyone’s surprise.

—————————————————

Colin looked up at his father over the chess board, only his eyes visible through his ghost costume. “Checkmate.”


	8. Sketch

Kurt closed his laptop in frustration. “Why is this so hard?” he asked. “Boys’ clothing lines are all either horrid-looking or impractical. Sometimes both. A garish t-shirt with a monster truck, or a dry-clean-only fragile cashmere sweater. It’s ridiculous. I don’t have any idea what I’m going to put Colin in this season.”

Blaine walked over and rubbed his shoulder. “I’m sure you’ll find something fabulous.”

Kurt looked up at him from the desk chair. “I just don’t know. I do not doubt my ability to find the most fabulous thing available, but I’m starting to think there’s just nothing out there. I want something that’s stylish and age-appropriate, and that won’t get torn to shreds the first time he wears it out of the house.”

“Well,” Blaine pulled out a sketch pad out of the desk drawer and set it in front of Kurt. “Then design it yourself.”

Kurt tapped his fingers on the desk thoughtfully. He opened the sketch pad to the first blank page, then reached for a pencil. He bounced the eraser end on the desk a few times, then flipped the pencil over and began to draw light lines on the page.

Blaine smiled as he watched the ideas take form. This was going to be Colin’s best wardrobe yet.


	9. Wall

Colin was staring at the wall again. Blaine watched him with the mixture of frustration and worry that was becoming quite familiar to him as a parent. He walked to the kitchen, where Kurt was making dinner, and absently stirred the pasta.

“Isn’t Early Intervention at least worth a try?” Blaine asked, picking up the thread of many prior conversations.

Kurt clenched his jaw. He looked out over the half-wall into the living room and watched Colin reach out his hand, slowly petting the wall on the other side of the room. “He’s fine, Blaine. It’s supposed to be fifty words by age two, and he says fifty words.”

“Barely,” Blaine muttered.

Kurt rubbed the block of Parmesan cheese a little bit more roughly over the grater.

“It’s not just the talking,” Blaine said. “It’s the staring at walls and the way he pets textures over and over. How he sometimes doesn’t make eye contact and he doesn’t seem to smile as much as the other kids we know.”

“He’s fine,” Kurt said. “He’s learning. He’s clearly very smart.” It was true. He could recognize all his colors and shapes and hundreds of animals and objects, even if he didn’t say the word he would point to the one someone else said and he was right every time. He built fantastic structures out of blocks and he could put together a wooden puzzle in no time flat. The other kids his age that they knew didn’t do anything close to that.

“But what if—”

Kurt cut Blaine’s sentence off. “No, Blaine,” he said, finally turning to look straight at his husband. “I don’t want some social worker coming in here and judging our family and our parenting and telling us how to raise our kid.”

“That’s not what it’s about!” Blaine objected.

“I get him. I  _get_  him.” Kurt’s hand trembled, and he set the block of cheese back down on the counter. “I wasn’t ‘normal’ when I was a kid, either, and I wouldn’t have wanted someone trying to make me normal. I wasn’t exactly like Colin is, but I was different too. He’s not sick, he’s just  _different_. Let him be who he is. He’s not hurting anyone.”

Blaine nodded slowly. “Okay,” he whispered. “We can wait and see.”

They’d have this conversation again, they both knew. Kurt reached out and took Blaine’s left hand in his right, and they stood side by side, watching Colin across the room as he stroked the wall, over and over again.


	10. Never

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a prequel to the entire verse, explaining how Kurt ended up becoming an opera singer.

Rachel burst through the curtain surrounding her bedroom, dressed in a black cocktail dress but barefoot and with no makeup on. “Kurt! I need you to be my date tonight.”

Kurt looked up from the couch, where he’d been watching a movie. “Need I remind you that I’m gay and you have a boyfriend?”

“Ha, ha, hilarious,” she said dryly, rolling her eyes. “Brody was going to take me to the opera tonight but he just texted me to say he has the flu and can’t go, and I want to see it so bad. I’ve never been to an opera before, and it’s so high class and New York, I can’t miss it. So you have to be my date. He said we could pick up the tickets at will call.”

“Hmm, that does sound like fun,” Kurt said. “I’ve never been to the opera, either. Okay, fine. I’ll go get dressed. What opera is it, anyway?”

“Le Nozze di Figaro,” Rachel said in her best Italian accent.

“Is that, like, a sequel to The Marriage of Figaro or something?”

“That  _is_  The Marriage of Figaro.”

“Oh. Shows how much I know about this opera thing.”

——————————————————————————

Kurt was transfixed. The soaring voices, the heartstopping harmonies, the ridiculous story—which he could follow thanks to the electronic supertitle system at the top of the stage. Opera was the most glorious thing ever, he decided.

Until halfway through act one, when Cherubino came on stage and started singing about how every woman he sees makes his heart flutter.

“I thought Cherubino was supposed to be a boy,” Kurt whispered to Rachel. “That is clearly a girl wearing men’s clothing.”

Rachel shrugged.

Later, when Cherubino disguised himself in women’s clothing, Kurt’s jaw hit the floor. “He doesn’t look like a boy in disguise!” he whispered harshly. “He looks like a girl. Because she is a girl. Why is a guy not playing this part?”

“Shhhh!!!”

The arias were gorgeous, Kurt had to admit that.

—————————————————

“A breeches role (also pants role or trouser role),” Kurt read aloud from Wikipedia when they got home, “is a role in which an actress appears in male clothing, or breeches , the standard male garment at the time breeches roles were introduced. In opera it also refers to any male character that is sung and acted by a female singer. Most often the character is an adolescent or a very young man, sung by a mezzo-soprano or contralto. The operatic concept assumes that the character is male, and the audience accepts him as such, even knowing that the actor is not.”

“But why do they do that?” Rachel asked. “Why not just have a man play the role, if the character is a man?”

Kurt scanned down the page. “I guess because they want the character to look young and have a high voice.”

“You know what singer I know who looks young and has a high voice?” Rachel asked, teasing.

“Shut up,” Kurt said, but he was smiling on the inside. He was silent for a minute, reading the page. “It does say here that in modern productions, some of these roles are being played by countertenors. That some directors prefer it because of the added realism. Wow, there are a ton of them! Look at this list!” He had to hit the Page Down button on his keyboard three times to get to the bottom of the (incomplete, the heading noted) list of operas with pants roles.

“That’s, like, ten times as many roles as you would be cast for on Broadway.”

“I can’t believe I never knew about this before.”

The next semester at NYADA, he signed up for an introductory opera performance class. By the end of the school year, he’d changed his major.


	11. Bell

_Dashing through the snow_   
_In a one-horse open sleigh_   
_O’er the fields we go_   
_Laughing all the way_   
_Bells on bobtail ring_   
_Making spirits bright_   
_What fun it is to ride and sing_   
_A sleighing song tonight!_

_Jingle bells, jingle bells,_   
_Jingle all the way._   
_Oh! what fun it is to ride_   
_In a one-horse open sleigh._   
_Jingle bells, jingle bells,_   
_Jingle all the way;_   
_Oh! what fun it is to ride_   
_In a one-horse open sleigh._

Singing winter duets had been a tradition since the year Kurt and Blaine met, and they were not about to give it up just because they were married and had kids. They’d chosen Jingle Bells this year because they thought Colin would like it. So they were surprised to see him with a perplexed look on his face when they finished the song.

“What’s the matter, Colin? Didn’t you like our duet?” Blaine asked.

“Taylor says it’s okay to play good guys and bad guys, but you shouldn’t laugh when you kill people because it’s not a nice thing to do and only the bad guys laugh when they kill people, not the good guys,” Colin said.

Blaine furrowed his brow. “That’s true, but what made you think of that after we sang  _Jingle Bells_?”

“Because the song said you laugh and sing about killing people. It’s not a nice song, Daddy, I don’t think you should sing it any more.”

“I don’t understand, Colin,” Kurt said. “That song is not about killing people, it’s about a sleigh ride.”

“‘Slay’ means ‘kill,’” Colin explained.

Kurt bit his bottom lip, hard, and squeezed his eyes shut, because Colin hated it when anyone laughed at him for any reason.

Blaine recovered more quickly. “Oh, honey, I guess we should have explained first. There’s one kind of ‘slay’ that means ‘kill,’ but this is about a different word that sounds the same. ‘Sleigh.’ It’s like a big sled that a lot of people can ride in together through the snow. It has nothing to do with killing people.”

“Oh,” Colin said. He seemed lost in thought for a moment. “So it’s not about pirates?”

“Pirates?” Kurt’s eyes nearly bugged out of his head. “What made you think of pirates?”

“Because they used an oar, so I thought it was on a boat,” Colin said.

“An oar?” Kurt said, thinking about the lyrics. “Oh! You mean ‘o’er the fields we go’! That’s not an oar like on a boat, that’s just another way of saying ‘over.’”

“Then why didn’t they just say ‘over’?” Colin asked.

“Good question,” Kurt said. “I guess it’s because a lot of Christmas songs are really old, and in the olden days people used some different words than they do now, but then people don’t go back and change the songs.”

“Also it would throw off the rhythm,” Blaine said.

“Can we sing a song about pirates next?” Colin asked. “I love pirates.”

“I don’t know any pirate songs off the top of my head, sweetie,” Blaine said. “How about if I look one up and practice it for tomorrow?”

“Okay,” Colin said, clearly disappointed.

“So you didn’t like our Christmas duet?” Kurt said, feeling a little bit hurt.

“Not really,” Colin said.

Blaine looked at Kurt, his mouth twisting with the effort not to laugh. “Well, at least he’s honest.”

“Screw this,” Kurt said. “Next year we’re doing ‘I syng of a mayden that is makeles.”


	12. Diner

They stopped for lunch at a diner in rural Pennsylvania, a truck stop on the route between New York City and Lima, on their way to visit the grandparents for the holidays. They filed into a booth, arguing good naturedly about booster seats and milk versus juice and whether macaroni and cheese was an acceptable lunch even though that had been dinner last night.

They’d just gotten their drink orders in when Kurt noticed the man staring at them. No, not at  _them_ , directly at Kurt himself. The man was sitting alone a few tables away. He was tall, burly, and overweight, with a scruffy reddish brown beard and overgrown hair, and his eyes were boring straight into Kurt’s head.

Kurt caught Blaine’s eye and then tilted his head the tiniest bit to the side toward the man, so Blaine could see what was going on. He cursed himself for letting the kids choose a booth instead of a table. If the man walked over to confront them, there would be no escape except right past him. “If he gets violent, just take the kids and run,” Kurt whispered. And then the man was walking up to them and Kurt and Blaine stared at each other, terrified.

“Excuse me,” the man said shyly. “Are you Kurt Hummel?”

Kurt’s eyes widened and he looked up at the man towering over their table. Kurt was not famous enough to be recognized. Blaine was a Broadway star and occasionally got recognized in public, but even he was far from a household name. Kurt, on the other hand, never got asked for an autograph except sometimes by a pleasantly obsessed opera fan at the stage door after a performance.  So, maybe this man was someone he used to know? Someone he’d gone to high school with?

“I’m sorry, do I know you?” Kurt asked.

“No, no, not at all,” the man said, blushing. “I … um … I’m a big fan. Of your singing, I mean. I … uh … mostly I just stick to country music but I found your album in this dollar bin of used CDs about a year ago and I picked it up because the photo of you on the cover was … um … interesting. And then when I listened to it, your voice was … well … it was like nothing I’ve ever heard. I listen to it all the time. In the truck. When I’m on the road.”

Kurt smiled. “That’s so nice to hear, thank you,” he said kindly. “I don’t have many fans out there, honestly. That CD didn’t sell well enough for me to ever do another one.”

“That’s a shame,” the man said. “Could … would you autograph it for me? It would make my day, really. I could just run out to the truck and get it?”

“Sure, absolutely!” Kurt said.

The man rushed out the door, and Kurt and Blaine both collapsed in relieved laughter once he was out of sight. “Oh my god!” Kurt moaned.

“What’s so funny, Papa?” Colin demanded.

“Nothing, Colin,” Kurt said, leaning over to hug him. “He’s a very nice man, that’s all.”

The man returned a moment later, fumbling with the CD case and a black sharpie. He handed them both to Kurt.

“What’s your name?” Kurt asked him.

“Pete Shepherd,” he said, blushing again. He seemed to notice Blaine and the kids for the first time. “I’m so sorry to interrupt you and your … friend. Y’all off on a boys’ trip? Camping?”

They usually tried to be subtle outside of New York, but Kurt decided all at once that it was safe. “My husband. And our kids. We’re headed to visit the grandparents.”

Pete’s eyes widened. “Well, I’ll be! I know it’s … some places … but not anywhere I’ve ever … it must be … nice. I’m sorry, god, what the hell am I saying, I’m so sorry to intrude.”

Kurt looked straight in his eyes with a friendly smile. “It’s okay, don’t worry about it. And yeah. It’s nice.” He looked back down to write on the CD cover, next to his own picture:  _For Pete. Courage. Kurt Hummel._

————————————————————-

“He’s totally been jerking off to your picture for the past year,” Blaine said that night, grinning.

“Shut up.”


	13. Moth

There was a butterfly exhibit at the science museum that everyone said was great for toddlers, so Kurt and Blaine brought Colin there one day. It was lovely, a huge glass dome with plants and flowers and hundreds of butterflies in all sizes and colors. They flitted from place to place, occasionally coming to rest on a visitor for a few moments, to everyone’s delight.

Kurt and Blaine led Colin through the walking path, pointing out the interesting butterflies they saw. “Look, a blue one! A yellow one! Wow, this one is so big! That is the biggest butterfly I’ve ever seen!” But Colin was having none of it. He seemed bored, looking more at the other people than the butterflies.

Until he found a gray moth sitting on a leaf. He stared at it, transfixed. For a minute, and then two minutes, and then five minutes, and Kurt began to wonder if the moth might be dead because it hadn’t moved even the tiniest bit.

“Bud-oh-fwy!” Colin said, pointing at it.

“It looks like a butterfly, but actually it’s just a moth,” Kurt said.

“Moff!”

“Mm-hmm. Look! Here’s a pretty orange one over here!”

“Moff!”

Colin watched the moth sit there for fifteen minutes, and it was nearing time for lunch and nap. They needed to get going, Blaine told him.

“Moff!”

“It’s a very nice moth, but it’s time to go home now.”

“Moff home!”

“You want to bring the moth home with us? I’m sorry, honey, the moth lives here.”

“Plus, it would destroy our clothes,” Kurt added.

“Moff home!”

“Sorry, the museum people won’t let us bring anything home.”

“MOFF HOME! MOFF HOME!!!!! MOFF HOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMEEEEEE!!!!!!”

Colin threw himself to the ground, prompting the moth to prove it was actually not dead and fly away. This had the effect of making Colin even more upset. He pounded his fists against the mulch-covered floor. “MOFF HOME! MOFF HOME! MOFF HOME!”

Blaine sighed and picked Colin up, trying to avoid his flailing fists.

“We’re  _those parents_ ,” Kurt said, embarrassed. “The ones who can’t control their kid in a public place.”

“Happens to everyone sometimes,” Blaine said. “Ow! Jesus! That’s going to leave a bruise.”


	14. Breath

The baby was quiet, but Blaine hadn’t returned to bed, so Kurt got up and crept into the makeshift nursery-slash-office that they’d put together on the fly. The only light in the room was what entered through the door from the hallway, but it was enough to see Blaine standing next to the crib, watching Colin sleep.

Kurt walked up to stand right beside Blaine, their shoulders lightly touching. They both looked down at Colin’s sleeping form, wrapped tightly in a swaddling blanket so that he resembled a human burrito, his chest lightly rising and falling with each breath.

“Hey,” Kurt said softly, leaning in to Blaine’s shoulder. “What’s going on?”

Blaine turned and looked at him, his face unreadable in the darkness. “He’s just so  _vulnerable_ ,” Blaine said. “Barely a week old, and completely dependent on the help of others for survival. He can’t even eat without help. Even if someone put a bottle right in front of him, he couldn’t even reach it or get it to his mouth on his own. Or if there was something dangerous, he couldn’t run away, or even crawl away, or even  _roll_  away, or even tell someone what _kind_ of danger it is, all he could do would be just lie there and cry. It’s so scary, thinking about how truly helpless he is.”

Kurt slid his arm around Blaine’s waist. “I guess that’s what growing up is about. Learning little by little how to take care of yourself. And maybe … trying not to forget that sometimes it’s okay to depend on other people. When they’re people who love you.”

“That’s … almost profound,” Blaine said. He rested his head on Kurt’s shoulder, smiling a little bit.

“I don’t know, it’s three in the morning. Best I could do.”

Blaine took a deep breath, reveling in the feeling of his chest pressing into Kurt’s side as his lungs expanded. “Okay. Back to bed?”

“Yeah.”

“Good.”


	15. Kept

Tess’s eyes lit up when she opened the box under the Christmas tree. She beamed at Burt. “Thank you so much, Grandpa, they are so beautiful! They will be perfect with my princess dress and fairy wings! Papa! Look how beautiful my new shoes are!”

They were kitten heels, white with scalloped edges and a velcro strap bedazzled with sequins and a tiny fabric rose. She seemed not to notice the slight scuff marks around the toe, but Kurt remembered each small mishap that had caused them, and how long he had spent trying to polish the marks away.

“They are very beautiful,” Kurt agreed. He turned to his father. “You kept those? I can’t believe it!”

“How could I possibly have gotten rid of your first pair of sensible heels?” Burt said, grinning.­ “And it looks like Tess will love them as much as you did.”


	16. Saint

When you’re in kindergarten, Valentine’s Day comes with an instruction book.

> Dear Parents,
> 
> Regardless of what day Valentine’s Day falls on, it will be celebrated on a Friday. The weekly schedule has space for parties on Fridays after lunch, not any other day. This year’s Valentine’s Day celebration is on February 16.
> 
> Children should bring in a shoebox—with lid—for art class on Thursday, February 15. The children will decorate the boxes to hold their valentine cards. In past years, we have found that boxes from adult-size shoes are preferable because child-size shoeboxes may not be large enough for some of the cards.
> 
> Children should bring valentines to distribute to the class on the day of the party.
> 
> Please make sure you bring enough valentines for every child in the class, plus the teacher and classroom assistant. Your child’s class has 20 students. Please bring 22 valentine cards.
> 
> Valentines must follow these guidelines or they WILL NOT BE DISTRIBUTED. Please read these guidelines carefully before buying or making valentines. Children become understandably upset when they are not allowed to give out their valentines.
> 
>   * All cards from a child must be the same or similar. Children may not give “special” valentines to their best friends.
>   * Valentines may not have negative or hateful messages.
>   * Valentines may not be addressed to a particular child. They should be distributable at random.
>   * Consistent with our school-wide ban on character clothing and items, valentines may not have pictures of licensed characters on them.
>   * Valentines may not contain candy, toys, or other gifts.
>   * Valentines should not be placed inside envelopes.
>   * Your child should sign his or her name on each valentine.
> 

> 
> If your child will be absent on the day of the party, his or her box will be placed out to collect valentines anyway, but to avoid classroom disruption, he or she will not be allowed to distribute valentines on another day.
> 
> Thank you for your cooperation! Happy Valentine’s Day!
> 
> Miss Perry

“How is this fun?” Kurt asked. “The whole point of Valentine’s Day is to get something special and meaningful and surprising. This is the exact opposite of that.”

“Actually, the point is that it’s a Catholic saint’s day,” Blaine said.

“I am not sacrificing one of my shoeboxes to this farce,” Kurt said. “Do you have anything Colin can use?”


	17. East

Kurt was picking at his food, and Blaine noticed it immediately. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Kurt said. “It’s just … Robert was talking about wanting to take the opera company on a tour through eastern Europe this summer. Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Ukraine, some other places. I just … I don’t see how I could go. With the kids and all. A month is way too long to be away.”

Blaine looked at him, his eyes twinkling the slightest bit. “We could all go.”

“That’s crazy!” Kurt said, dropping his fork. “It would be so expensive … they’ll only pay for my stuff, not the whole family.”

“What is the point of having all this money if not to spend it on awesome stuff like month-long trips to eastern Europe?” Blaine asked.

“Are you serious?”

“Completely,” Blaine said. “Besides, it’s educational.”

Taylor looked up from cutting Tess’s chicken into bite-sized pieces, her eyes hopeful but not daring to ask.

“No way we could do this without you coming, Tay,” Blaine said.

“Oh my god! I love you!”


	18. Lightning

Tess squealed, chasing Asher and Colin around the backyard of the Hudson-Hummel house. It was a humid summer evening, but not too hot, the evening twilight now completely faded into night. “Look!” she shouted. “A lightning bug!”

Asher turned. “I see it! Look, another one!”

Colin swooped in, trying unsuccessfully to catch one between his hands.

Blaine turned to Kurt, sitting next to him on the porch swing. “Isn’t it weird, how different our childhoods were from our kids’? I used to chase lightning bugs all the time, but they only get to do it for a week or two when we’re in Ohio.”

“They’re city kids,” Kurt said. “They know how to get around on the subway, but they’re surprised to see stars in the sky.”

“It’s kind of sad,” Blaine said.

“It’s not bad, it’s just different,” Kurt said.

“Yeah…” Blaine agreed, but there was a note of wistfulness in his voice that Kurt didn’t miss.


	19. Back

Aside from the sound of  _Finding Nemo_  coming from the TV, everything was quiet when Taylor walked in the door. “I’m back! How did everything go while I was on vacation?”

Kurt and Blaine looked at each other. They turned to her with big smiles pasted on their faces, but they couldn’t hide the dark circles under their bloodshot eyes.

“Great!” Kurt said. “Everything was great!”

“The baby slept. Occasionally.” Blaine said.

“Asher and Tess didn’t color on anything that cost more than eight hundred dollars,” Kurt added sadly.

“Colin says the way I make macaroni and cheese—out of the box, mind you—is quote ‘vastly inferior to Taylor’s method,’” Blaine said, his smile fading to a pout.

“We’re so glad you’re back,” Kurt said. Blaine nodded his vigorous agreement.

“This sounds like a good time to ask for a raise,” Taylor said.

Kurt sighed. “Aren’t we both supposed to be actors? How do we suck so bad at lying?”


	20. Fireplace

The mountain air was chilly, but their rented cabin was warm and cozy, especially once Blaine got the real wood fire started in the fireplace. It had been a difficult choice between hot cocoa and red wine, but in the end they went with the wine.

“Do you know what my favorite part about this place is?” Kurt asked, his voice dreamy.

“The fireplace?” Blaine guessed.

“That’s good too,” Kurt said. “But no. I was thinking of the complete lack of children.”

Blaine smiled. “Just like old times. I hardly remember what it was like, honestly.”

Kurt looked at him, eyes twinkling. “Oh, I remember, all right.” He hooked his fingers under Blaine’s collar and pulled him in for a hot, lingering kiss.

“Hmmm,” Blaine said when they pulled away. “I may have an inkling of it … maybe you could continue to jog my memory?”

Kurt climbed into Blaine’s lap and kissed him hard, pushing him down to lie on the couch. And even after all these years, the sparks between them were as real as the ones crackling in the fireplace.


	21. Local

Kurt sighed angrily. “I still cannot believe there’s such a thing as the ‘right’ kindergarten, let alone how much money and effort and  _testing_  it takes to get into it.  _Testing_ , Blaine. He’s five years old. Since when do you have to know stuff to get into kindergarten? Why can’t we just sign him up at the local public school like when I was five?”

“That’s not how it works in New York,” Blaine said.

“You mean that’s not how it works in New York  _when you have money_ ,” Kurt said in a snide tone.

“We need to do what’s best for Colin,” Blaine said.

“I know,” Kurt said. “It just pisses me off.”

“It’s a terrible system, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”

Kurt nodded and picked up another application form from the stack on the desk. “How much do we have to bribe this one?”


	22. Snow

Tess flipped through her Christmas-themed coloring book thoughtfully. She settled on a page showing two boys skating on a frozen lake under lightly falling snow. She picked up a red crayon and started shading in one boy’s scarf, humming softly to herself.

Blaine walked past on his way to the kitchen and caught a glimpse of the picture. He paused to listen as she switched from humming into soft singing, shifting her red coloring to the other boy’s gloves. “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas,” Tess sang.

She put down the red and picked up a black crayon, coloring in the first boy’s coat. Blaine silently waved Kurt over to watch. “With every Christmas card I write. May your days be merry and bright.”

She replaced black with gray and filled in the other boy’s scarf and a square pattern on his coat, then turned to a blue crayon and filled in the rest of the coat, adding a swirly blue pattern over the scarf when she finished. “And may all your Christmases be white,” she sang, finally setting the last crayon back in the box.

Tess turned around. “Daddy? Papa? Why are you crying?”

Kurt reached out his hand to stroke her fiery-red hair. “Just bittersweet memories, Tess of the Fairies.”

Tess giggled at the nickname he always used for her. “Do you want to color a snowman?” she asked.

“Sure, sounds like fun,” Kurt said, sitting down beside her and wiping his eyes dry.


	23. Faith

Rachel arrived for dinner at their apartment with a menorah, candles, a bag of chocolate coins, and a handful of dreidels.

“This isn’t a Hanukkah party, Rachel,” Kurt said.

“But it’s the fourth night of Hanukkah,” Rachel said. “I have to light the menorah tonight anyway, so I figured I’d just bring it here and share the tradition with you. Come on, it’s fun, and no big deal, it’ll take two minutes, three minutes tops.”

“Share it with  _us_?” Kurt said with a skeptical tone. “You mean share it with Asher. Who is six months old and won’t even have any idea what’s going on. You know who will be asking a bunch of questions about it? Colin. And what are we supposed to tell him?”

“Um … that Aunt Rachel is celebrating Hanukkah and he can have a piece of gelt?” she suggested.

“We agreed that you wouldn’t try to push your faith on our kids,” Kurt reminded her.

“And I’m not pushing! I’m just … celebrating my own holiday in your presence.”

“Rachel? No breaking out into song.”

“I would never,” she assured him.

She sang two Hebrew prayers and Ma’oz Tzur.


	24. Merry

It was years before everyone Kurt and Blaine considered family managed to show up for Christmas at their house all at once. They celebrated with family every year, but they considered so many disparate, far-flung people to be “family” that Christmas usually consisted of several different gatherings, often in two or even three states, and still sending regrets to others. It had taken so long for the set of coincidences that brought everyone together, not a single one of Kurt and Blaine’s kids still believed in Santa Claus. They had a house full of teenagers and tweens. Kurt looked around him and wondered where the time had gone.

His dad and Carole, both now retired. James and Anna Anderson, never missing an opportunity to see their grandkids even when the cute baby phase was long past. Cooper, still a struggling actor after all these years. Finn and his wife and kids. Rachel and Puck and their kids. Brittany and Maeve. Taylor and her husband and their kids. The new nanny, Abby. A few local friends they couldn’t imagine their lives without. Kurt tried to count, but people kept moving around and he got lost after thirty. It was a little overwhelming. He was glad this hadn’t happened when they’d still lived in the city.

Burt walked up behind Kurt and clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Far cry from when Christmas was just you and me, kiddo.”

Carole spent the day kicking everyone but her Official Designated Helpers out of the kitchen repeatedly. Christmas movies and video games battled for time slots on the big TV in the den. Every Christmas song ever written was sung at least twice, and some Hanukkah songs too, and random favorites. (“Dad! Not Katy Perry  _again_!”). The Christmas tree was hung with ornaments representing more than forty years of memories.

Blaine caught Kurt under the mistletoe after dinner and gave him a quick peck on the lips. “Merry Christmas to the love of my life,” he said.

Kurt smiled. “You say that every year.”

“It’s always true.”


End file.
